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Friday, May 02, 2014

Drivers Say Talladega Qualifying Will Be Unpredictable

With Sprint Cup Series qualifying less than 24 hours
away at Talladega Superspeedway, there is no clear consensus in the garage area
regarding what might occur.

“I
don’t know what is going to exactly happen,” admitted six-time series champion
Jimmie Johnson today. “But to win the pole, you’re going to have to go out
there and race.

“The
run that you can get on a group that it a football field or two ahead of you is
so dramatic. A 10 or 12-car line won’t be as fast as somebody who falls way
back in the pack and has a chance to pull up into the pack over a lap or two. That’s
what every driver is going to try to do.

“Setting
that up is going to be tough,” he admitted, “because everybody is going to be
trying it; and if you see someone behind you coming (fast), why stay on the gas
to help them? So, bailing out of the gas, breaking up the pack, and things like
that are all possible.

“It’s
going to be exciting, for sure.”

Johnson
said he is still trying to determine the risk versus reward of qualifying en
masse.

“I’m
trying to come to grips with where I take a large risk,” he said. “We’re just
not sure right now what to expect. We wanted to come here with a plan in place
on how to qualify, but our opinion seems to change every 15 minutes.”

Teammate
Dale Earnhardt, Jr. was equally cryptic, saying, “I just don’t know (what will happen). The guy
that gets the pole is going to have to hit it just right. I’m not sure what
our approach is, yet. We’ve got some conversations to have between Steve
(Letarte) and our teammates, and feel out everybody’s opinion (on) what they
want to do.

Earnhardt also said he is not willing to take
major chances tomorrow in search of a prime starting spot.

“We built a brand new race car, so our
willingness to take risks is going to be pretty limited,” he said. “It
doesn’t matter where you start, other than just picking (a stall) on pit road.”

Team Penske driver and two-time 2014 winner Joey
Logano had a more succinct prediction for tomorrow’s qualifying session,
saying, “Somebody’s going to wreck a wreck car. In fact, it’ll probably be more
than one.”